1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a commodity sales management system. Particularly, the present invention relates to a commodity purchasing management system for acquiring chances of purchase by new customers, while attaining the inventory for the customers who have selected the commodities.
2. Description of the Related Art
A selling or shopping method at a shop may be roughly classified into two types of selling methods. In one selling method, a customer carries a commodity selected from those being displayed to a determined place of settlement, such as a place where a cash register is installed, and purchases the relevant commodity at the place of settlement. The selling method has been employed, for example, at a shop such as a supermarket for dealing with miscellaneous commodities for daily use.
In another selling method, the desired commodity may be purchased by designating a commodity to be purchased at the place of settlement using a commodity card attached to a corresponding commodity in a showcase. This selling method is employed, for example, at a volume retailer or the like of household electric appliances. The practical sequence in this selling method is as follows.
First, a customer decides to purchase based upon samples of commodities displayed in the showcase by evaluating the same with a hand or the like and then obtains commodity cards as many as the commodities desired to be purchased from the commodity cards attached to the showcase or the like corresponding to the desired commodities. When the customer presents the commodity cards at the place of settlement, the commodities to be purchased may be designated and these commodities are transferred or delivered after the settlement.
Accordingly, in this selling method using the commodity cards described above, it is required that the number of commodity cards attached to the corresponding commodities in the showcase indicates the number of commodities in inventories provided for selling. However, a customer having obtained the commodity card does not always purchase the commodity designated by the commodity card. Moreover, in some cases, the commodity card may be taken by other action, such as mischief or the like, or a commodity card may be replaced or misplaced with that attached to another commodity. Therefore, the number of commodity cards often does not adequately indicate the number of commodities in inventories provided for selling. Accordingly, even when the inventory provided for selling is prepared, the commodity card is sometimes missing, resulting in the situation that a chance of purchase of/by a customer who is hoping to purchase a certain commodity may be lost.
In view of eliminating such disadvantage, supplement of commodity cards must be performed adequately so that the number of commodity cards attached to the commodities in the showcase is always matched with the number of commodities in inventories provided for selling. However, for example, there can be a situation when a customer is discussing or contemplating purchase of the relevant commodity from which the attached commodity card has been removed by other customer and the other customer who is in the course of moving to the place of settlement has the commodity card of the relevant commodity. Therefore, when a commodity card supplement is made at a time of adjusting the number of commodity cards so that the commodity card is matched with the number of commodities in inventories provided for selling, there can be a situation in which commodity cards within the shop exceed the number of commodities in inventories provided for selling. In this case, a situation may be generated that a customer who has obtained a commodity card cannot purchase such commodity, because the commodity cards exceed the number of inventory commodities.